Absolutely guaranteed drop-dead-end-of-the-world predictions in the last 100 years…

1914 – Jehovah’s Witnesses calculated this expiration date from made-up stories, as is their wont, later revising it to 1915. Then 1918. Then 1920, 1925, 1941, 1975, 1994… ah, who even pays attention to them anymore?

1919 – Six planets would align and tear apart the Sun. Or not.

1936 – Herbert W. Armstrong, who cobbled together several religious disciplines and called it the Worldwide Church of God, tried to stir up his own end-of-world scenario to build up a following. The revised date was 1975.

1948 – The Jews finally got an official homeland, and Christians ran for the hills, thinking this was the final sign of the Apocalypse.

1953 – David Davidson’s “The Great Pyramid, Its Divine Message” stirred up some sales with its doom and gloom message.

1957 – Not having any luck with their own predictions, the Jehovah’s Witnesses laid a 1957 prediction on a California padre named Mihran Ask.

1959 – Future Branch Davidian leader Florence Houteff predicted world’s end for 1959, although it wasn’t until 1993 that most of the faithful went up in flames with David Koresh.

1960 – Another old pyramid-related prediction came and went.

1967 – Another rousing victory by the Israelis in their 6-day war got Christians wringing their hands all over again. Simps.

1973 – The comet due to hit Earth as predicted by Moses David (David Berg) of The Children of God apparently missed.

You Gotta Believe

1981 – Chuck Smith, another California padre, calls it wrong.

1981 – Arnold Murray of Shepherd’s Chapel had his own 1981 prediction. I wonder if he and Chuck Smith compared notes afterward.

1981 – The Reverend Sun Myung Moon liked 1981, too.

1982 – Marion Gordon “Pat” Robertson went with a 1982 Armageddon, and when that didn’t work out, then ran for President in 1988.

1982 – Another alignment of the planets doom scenario made astronomers John Gribben and Setphen Plagemann poop their pants, but the rest of us got through it okay.

1984 to 1999 – The Rajneesh movement predicted a series of natural and man-made events of global destruction for this period. Well, it did rain a lot.

1985 – Shepherd’s Chapel’s Arnold Murray was at it again, saying Armageddon would start on June 8th of that year in Alaska. At least he had the balls to be specific.

1986 – Since his 1973 comet missed the Earth, Moses David went with a Battle of Armageddon for 1986, and the return of zombie Jesus in 1993.

1987 – 2000 – Lester Sumrall sold a lot of books predicting a lot of doom, and was wrong on every count.

1988 – Again blaming the formation of Israel, perennial predictor of preposterous prophesies Hal Lindsey incorrectly guessed 1988 as the Final Year.

1988 – The year Alfred “Super-Psychic A.S. Narayana” Schmielewsky said it would all end. He was later murdered after his Super Psychic powers failed to warn him of a gunman at his front door.

1988 – A 1981 movie called “The Man Who Saw Tomorrow” helped prove what a crackpot Nostradamus was.

1988 – Edgar Whisenaut, a NASA scientist, became a best-selling author with his book “88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Occur in 1988.” October 11, to be specific. I want my money back.

1990-ish – Some guy named Peter Ruckman came up with his own nebulous timetable.

2009 – The Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator will go on line in November, create a black hole, and destroy the Universe. Yeah, sure.

2012 – What did the ancient Mayans know, anyway?

O.C. DeeDee

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